The raw materials required for the production of Malt Whisky are barley, water and yeast. The production process can be broken down into five stages.
MALTING
First the barley is MALTED, that is the barley is germinated to convert the starches in each grain into a simple sugar. Distillers look for plump, ripe barley with plenty of starch and not too much nitrogen.
The object of malting is, therefore, to develop Enzymes and in particular Diastase of Malt and to modify or make friable the starch contained in the grain. This is carried out in three stages, steeping, germinating and kilning or drying. These processes must be affected in such a manner as to provide maximum fermentable matter (Malt Extract), adequate Diastolic Power and ensure minimum malting loss due to respiration etc.
MASHING
The object of Mashing is to render soluble and to dissolve as much of the valuable contents of the Malt as is possible. This produces a sweet liquid or sugar solution termed Wort containing in addition to the sugars intermediate products.
The materials used in the Mashing process are Water and ground Malted Barley. The quality of the water plays an important part throughout this process and finally in the quality of the spirit produced.
FERMENTATION
Yeast is a unicellular micro organism, that is to say, it is a living organism whose individual units are visible only under the microscope. It belongs to the planet kingdom and is classified as one of the fungi. There are many different species of yeast but the one normally encountered in the distilling and brewing industries is called Saccharomyces Cerevisiae. To give some ideas of the minute size of this micro-organism, three fully grown yeast cells placed end to end will measure only one thousandth part of an inch and in a 1 lb packet of yeast, there are approximately seven billion cells. (7,000,000,000,000).
DISTILLATION
Distilling takes place in pairs of copper pot stills with tall 'swan-necks'. One is usually larger than the other, otherwise their shapes, heights and sizes vary from distillery to distillery. The life of a still is between 15 and 30 years, depending on how hard it is used.
The two main operations in distilling are turning liquid into vapor and then vapor into liquid i.e. vaporization and then condensation. Distillation is simply a means of separation by these operations. A liquid can be separated from solids or one liquid from another and either the distillate or the residue collected.
MATURATION
In this discourse up to this point no mention has been made of whisky. This is simply because the spirit produced cannot legally be termed Scotch whisky until it has been matured in oak casks for at least three years.
If it is intended to sell the Malt Spirit as a single Malt Whisky then at least eight years maturation or preferably ten to twelve years will be necessitated
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